Wagering game machines, such as slot machines, video poker machines and the like, have been a cornerstone of the gaming industry for several years. Generally, the popularity of such machines depends on the likelihood (or perceived likelihood) of winning money at the machine and the intrinsic entertainment value of the machine relative to other available gaming options. Where the available gaming options include a number of competing wagering game machines and the expectation of winning at each machine is roughly the same (or believed to be the same), players are likely to be attracted to the most entertaining and exciting machines. Shrewd operators consequently strive to employ the most entertaining and exciting machines, features, and enhancements available because such machines attract frequent play and hence increase profitability to the operator. Therefore, there is a continuing need for wagering game machine manufacturers to continuously develop new games and gaming enhancements that will attract frequent play.
Wagering game programmers are also interested in programming games that can make wagering games applications easier to program, easier to run, and less taxing on wagering game machine resources. For example, many programmers program wagering games relying on a “morph targeting” method for changing shapes of three-dimensional (3D) objects that are presented on the wagering games. Morph targeting uses target shapes that describe a beginning and end position of a 3D object (e.g., an open and closed position of a character's mouth or eyelid). Morph targeting includes indicating a morph degree, delta, or difference (e.g., between 0 amount of morph to 100% of morph) with predefined beginning and end positions that cannot vary from those degrees, but that only change shape within the range of morph difference. Rendering hardware on a wagering game machine, which modifies 3D objects using morph targeting, has to store a set of pre-defined 3D models of the 3D object. A 3D model is a mathematical, wireframe representation of the 3D object. Morph targeting utilizes the sets of pre-defined 3D models to apply shape modifications from the beginning point of the morph degree to the end point of the morph degree (for a non-fluid transition) and every stage of shape modification between beginning point to end point (for a fluid transition). Morph targeting uses the pre-defined 3D models at each of the stages of shape change for the 3D object. However, processing the multiple pre-defined 3D models via morph targeting can tax hardware resources, require extra storage space, and waste energy.